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Kim Brown: This is the Gresham Tree Team, so they're going to be learning how to do different urban forestry activities, and also just those basic first job training skills. Their main job of street tree inventory is baseline data for the City of Gresham. The City of Gresham does not have any data in terms of where street trees are in their neighborhoods. The Rockwood / Wilks East /North Gresham area has very low urban tree canopy compared to the rest of Gresham.

Siver Dilshad: We measure trees and we just plot where they are to see how healthy the trees are, and see which area needs more trees so it can increase the air quality and the health of the area.

Kim Brown: This data will be used for the City of Gresham to make decisions in the future on urban forest policies, and just where hopefully they can plant more trees so that they have the same access to greenery and beautiful spaces as everyone else.

Jenna Tate: Kim taught us about all the different trees, the leaf structures, and all that type of stuff. And that was the moment where I was like: ‘Oh, all these trees have names. And there's, you know, all different sorts of qualities about them.’ That was the moment where I was like: ‘That's pretty neat. That's awesome.’

Kim Brown: They have learned skills to be able to work in environmental science, environmental management, habitat restoration. So they could be biologists, they could be some sort of researcher. But it doesn't necessarily have to be science based. They learned community engagement skills. They learned data collection.

Jenna Tate: I've always had a really tough time trying to communicate with folks. So now I got that under my belt. Learning to be resilient in the rain and the heat and everything.

Kim Brown: They've done so many activities at this point that they could really use those job skills in any job.